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A Signoria (from Signore or Lord) was an abstract noun meaning (roughly)
'government; governing authority; de facto sovereignty; lordship in
many of the Italian city states
during the medieval and renaissance periods.

The perennial "power vacuum" of medieval Italy

In the sixth century AD the EmperorJustinian reconquered Italy from the Ostrogoths. The invasion of a new wave of
Germanic tribes, the Lombards, doomed this attempt to resurrect the
Western Roman Empire but the
repercussions of Justinian's failure resounded further still. For
the next thirteen centuries, whilst new nation-states arose in the lands north of the
Alps, the Italian political landscape was a patchwork of feuding
city states, petty tyrannies, and foreign
invaders.

For several centuries the armies and Exarchs,
Justinian's successors, were a tenacious force in Italian affairs -
strong enough to prevent other powers such as the Arabs, the Holy Roman
Empire, or the Papacy from establishing a
unified Italian state, but too weak to drive these "interlopers"
and recreate Roman Italy.

Later Imperial orders such as the Carolingians, the Ottonians and Hohenstaufens also managed to impose their
overlordship in Italy. But their successes were as transitory as
Justinian's and a unified Italian state remained a dream until the
nineteenth century.

No ultramontanian Empire could succeed in unifying Italy - or in
achieving more than a temporary hegemony - because its success
threatened the survival of medieval Italy's other powers: the
Byzantines, the Papacy, and the
Normans. These - and the descendants of the
Lombards - who became fused with earlier Italian ethnic groups -
conspired against, fought, and eventually destroyed any attempt to
create a dominant political order in Italy.

It was against this vacuum of authority that one must view the rise
of the institutions of the Signoria and the Communi.

Signoria versus the commune

In Italian history the rise of the Signoria is a phase often
associated with the decline of the medieval commune system of government and
the rise of the dynastic state. In this context the word Signoria
(here to be understood as "Lordly Power") is used in opposition to
the institution of the Commune or city republic.

Indeed, contemporary observers and modern historians see the rise
of the Signoria as a reaction to the failure of the
Communi to maintain law-and-order and suppress party
strife and civil discord. In the anarchic conditions that often
prevailed in medieval Italian city states, people looked to strong
men to restore order and disarm the feuding elites.

In times of anarchy or crisis, cities sometimes offered the
Signoria to individuals perceived as strong enough to save the
state. For
example, the Tuscan state of Pisa offered the
Signoria to Charles VIII of
France in the hope that he would protect the independence of
Pisa from its long term enemy Florence.Similarly,
Siena offered the Signoria to Cesare Borgia.

In Florence this arrangement was unofficial as it was not
constitutionally formalized before the Medici
were expelled from the city in 1494.

In other
states (such as the Milan of the
Visconti) the dynasty's right to
the Signoria was a formally recognized part of the
Commune's constitution, which had been "ratified" by the
People and recognized by the Pope or the Holy
Roman Empire.

Origins of the word Signoria

In a few states the word Signoria was sometimes used to refer to
the constitutional government of the Republic rather than the
dictatorial power exercised by an individual tyrant or
dynasty.

For
example, the word Signoria was sometimes used in Renaissance times
to refer to the Government of the Republics of Florence or of
Venice - as in Shakespeare's Othello where Othello says:

"Let him do his spite:

My services which I have done the signiory

Shall out-tongue his complaints"

(Act one, scene one)

Occasionally the word Signoria referred to specific organs or
functions of the state. The Signoria
of Florence was the highest executive organ, while the Signoria
of the Republic of
Venice was mainly a judicial body.